The Natural Law Part VIII

How does the Natural Law tell us what to do?

John Paul II used Christ as the very definition of Truth. The objective moral standard is a Person—Christ. I can just hear the comments in regards to, “well what if you don’t believe in Christ”? We’ll get to that later.

God made human nature. He knows us backwards and forwards. He also is about “super abundant justification”. What does that mean? Every act of an Infinite Person has infinite value. The Father loves us so infinitely and wants us to understand how important it is to make the right choices so much so that he allowed his Son, The Christ, to go through crucifixion. Why? Because of His Love He wants us to be eternally with Him in perfect happiness.

The Natural Law is what He gave us in our nature knowable to our reason. The Natural Law shows us how to act and to make sure He gave us the Ten Commandments which are specifications of the Natural Law. And finally, He gave us the Church, which is the Body of Christ, in order to provide answers to us in order that we know what exactly to do, and how we are to conduct our lives. The Church is a great grace and gift.

You can know truth. There is self-evident truth; through speculative reason we know the principle of contradiction—a thing can’t be and be at the same time under the same aspect. One example is that the same action cannot be morally right and morally wrong at the same time. All things seek the good through practical reason; that is what is the good and what is in accord with the thing’s nature. What is our good? We naturally know the basic inclinations of human nature are good. What are they?

1) To seek the good including the highest good which is God.
2) To preserve self.
3) To preserve the species
4) To live in community
5) And to know and to choose.

Why is suicide objectively wrong? Because through reason we can see it violates “to preserve self”. But, because someone commits an objective wrong does not mean that he’s subjectively culpable. Culpable means one knows an act is “wrong” and then has the will to decide to do it and then acts. It’s one of the most intense arguments that I have with my children. “You’re judging people, Dad.” No, I’m not. Why? Because the action maybe objectively immoral but for some reason that individual, which I am not privy to, commits it anyway. Judgment has been given to Christ, and Christ alone. An example would be someone stealing a loaf of bread from a store. Objectively, he is stealing. But throw into the mix that individual would starve to death or his children would starve to death if he had not taken that loaf puts it in a completely different light. How do we know something is wrong? Because Christ has given us His Church which is the Body of Christ, to help us to know. The Magesterium of the Church, which simply means the teaching authority, is the body that gives us the way to know the applications of the Natural Law. The Church is the authentic interpreter of the Natural Law; the Vicar of Christ as the bishop in union with Christ.

The Natural Law is in context, or in union, with the Lawgiver. A single act can’t be both right and wrong, moral and immoral, true and false, at the same time under the same conditions. Does the Natural Law change? No. But its applications change. If you borrow something you’re required to return it. Suppose you borrow a gun from a friend to go target shooting. Before it’s time to give it back you find out that the friend wants to murder someone. You have a greater obligation to keep the pistol. This is a facet of the Natural Law; higher duty or obligation.

St. Thomas Aquinas, and John Paul II later, made the statement that sin can darken one’s intellect. The result of original sin is the concupiscence or disorder in our nature where we have difficulty in reasoning towards the correct result. St. Thomas asks his first question in his “Summa” whether or is there something else man needs besides philosophy. The answer is ‘yes’. Revelation is needed with regards to those things we can not figure out by our selves such as the “Trinity”. Revelation is also needed for those things that we can figure out. Why? Because habitual sin, that of turning consistently and constantly away from our Maker, the Lawgiver, dims our intellect and makes it difficult for one to reach the right conclusion as to the Natural Law. The Magesterium becomes all the more important. It is a great gift and not an adversary. People differ in regards to what the Natural Law means (it’s all a matter of private judgment; present minds differ; relativism and boiling down to a matter of consensus. There are churches today that vote on moral actions such as gay marriage, abortion, etc.). That is another reason why we have been given the Magesterium which is the authentic interpreter of the Natural Law.

One of the problems of law is that it has been reduced to consensus, that everything is up for a majority vote, including moral principles. This is legal positivism. Legal positivism makes the statement that all law by the mere factor that it is law means that it’s valid law. St. Aquinas once again states that if a man made law is contrary to the Natural Law the man made law becomes void. We need to know this standard which the interpreter of the Natural Law is necessary not only for oneself doing a bad thing but also being wrongfully cooperative with that unjust law.

There are two types of cooperation with evil: one, you intend to support the evil act and the second is material cooperation or the ability to facilitate the evil act of someone else but we don’t intend to do that evil act or support it formally ourselves.